Wednesday, June 02, 2010

Stan Rogers, Canadian singer and songwriter, died in an airplane fire on this day in 1983, while returning to Canada from a performance in Texas. He was only 33 years old.

Stan’s music was classified as “folk”, and tended toward maritime style, stories of farmers, and times out of Canada’s past. “Northwest Passage”, “The Field Behind the Plow”, and “Lies” are among his best-known songs.

Since Stan joined the too-long list of musicians who left us before they should have, his younger brother Garnet has been reminding us of Stan’s music, as well as giving us his own style, more rock-and-blues oriented.

At last the kids are gone now for the dayShe reaches for the coffee as the school bus pulls awayAnother day to tend the house and planFor Friday at the Legion when she’s dancing with her manSure was a bitter winter but Friday will be fineAnd maybe last year’s Easter dress will serve her one more timeShe’d pass for twenty-nine but for her eyesBut winter lines are telling wicked lies

All lies, all those lines are telling wicked liesLies, all lies. Too many lines there in that faceToo many to erase or to disguise, they must be telling lies

Is this the face that won for her the manWhose amazed and clumsy fingers put that ring upon her handNo need to search that mirror for the yearsThe menace in their message shouts across the blur of tearsSo this is beauty’s finish, like Rodin’s “Belle Heaulmière”The pretty maiden trapped inside the ranch wife’s toil and careWell, after seven kids, that’s no surpriseBut why cannot her mirror tell her lies

All lies, all those lines are telling wicked liesLies, all lies. Too many lines there in that faceToo many to erase or to disguise, they must be telling lies

Then she shakes off the bitter web she woveAnd turns to set the mirror, gently, face down by the stoveShe gathers up her apron in her handPours a cup of coffee, drips Carnation from the canAnd thinks ahead to Friday, ’cause Friday will be fineShe’ll look up in that weathered face that loves hers, line for lineTo see that maiden shining in his eyesAnd laugh at how her mirror tells her lies

All lies, all those lines are telling wicked liesLies, all lies. Too many lines there in that faceToo many to erase or to disguise, they must be telling lies

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